En-route Connectivity
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En-route Connectivity
Hi there,
If I can pick your brains, what do those of you who fly internationally (pan-European) use for connectivity? Both broad and narrow band?
There are only two things I can think of in terms of a private pilot, one being GPRS, the other Wifi. I've never tried GPRS, other than using the telephone's inbuilt browser, which works fine for me route planning and METAR purposes, and those Wifi connections are a bit hit and miss (more of the latter unless in a big place), and expensive unless you happen to be somewhere where free municipal connectivity is provided.
My primary use case involves, as mentioned, route planning and weather briefing, which can be done over low bandwidth, but I also like having a bit more speed to be able to download the odd aerodrome chart, and also firing up Google Earth, zoom into a place and look at the pics, see if I like it before I go there
As I said, private flying, so things like BGAN are out of the question (and BGAN is crap anyway).
Suggestions, comments, and anecdotes all welcome.
If I can pick your brains, what do those of you who fly internationally (pan-European) use for connectivity? Both broad and narrow band?
There are only two things I can think of in terms of a private pilot, one being GPRS, the other Wifi. I've never tried GPRS, other than using the telephone's inbuilt browser, which works fine for me route planning and METAR purposes, and those Wifi connections are a bit hit and miss (more of the latter unless in a big place), and expensive unless you happen to be somewhere where free municipal connectivity is provided.
My primary use case involves, as mentioned, route planning and weather briefing, which can be done over low bandwidth, but I also like having a bit more speed to be able to download the odd aerodrome chart, and also firing up Google Earth, zoom into a place and look at the pics, see if I like it before I go there
As I said, private flying, so things like BGAN are out of the question (and BGAN is crap anyway).
Suggestions, comments, and anecdotes all welcome.
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Well, in the UK I stick to a 3 Mobile Broadband Dongle. Which is HSDPA which gives between 1 -2 Mb data in most places in the UK. It will fail back to GPRS so you can still do your lower bandwidth stuff - but at least you can do it on a full screen.
3 are really good with Roaming and Data, in that if you use one of their "sister" networks in Europe it comes off your data allowance.
Check out: 3 - Mobile Broadband- Got a question?
Hope the mods don't mind my recommendation - I have no connection to them at all - just use the service and find it very good value for money. Not sure how good the other networks mobile broadband / roaming deals are.
You could also get a new "Smart Phone" with a data package and use it as a modem for your laptop to take advantage of the HSDPA connectivity.
HC.
3 are really good with Roaming and Data, in that if you use one of their "sister" networks in Europe it comes off your data allowance.
Check out: 3 - Mobile Broadband- Got a question?
Hope the mods don't mind my recommendation - I have no connection to them at all - just use the service and find it very good value for money. Not sure how good the other networks mobile broadband / roaming deals are.
You could also get a new "Smart Phone" with a data package and use it as a modem for your laptop to take advantage of the HSDPA connectivity.
HC.
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3 are really good with Roaming and Data, in that if you use one of their "sister" networks in Europe it comes off your data allowance.
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I find GPRS works most place where GSM works.
3G is just a faster version of GPRS and works slightly less well than GPRS in terms of coverage.
HSDPA is essentially another name for 3G.
EDGE is a double speed GPRS, not well supported in Europe but they have it in the USA.
I carry a Thinkpad X60S 1704 lightweight laptop for flight planning. This has a built-in (Vodafone-locked, unfortunately) GPRS/3G module, and I so often find that wifi is either not available or is priced at silly rates, so I use that.
For airborne use, I have been playing with Thuraya satellite phones but need to do more work on it. It does work but (short of spending loads of money) only as a 9600 baud dial-up.
GPRS and 3G data is charged at the same rate per MB. On contracts, one often gets some free monthly allowance, though this tends to apply only to NON roaming usage (basically everything abroad is roaming - even a Vodafone UK SIM card connecting to Vodafone France is classed as 'roaming' - a huge ripoff). The juiciest contract deals have an allowance on roaming data too. PAYG data is usually expensive. There have been various deals on UK (non roaming) but roaming is usually £5 (Virgin) to £10 (Vodafone area) per MB - got to make sure those windoze and antivirus updates are disabled!!!! I had disabled all my auto updates and still blew away £20 on my last holiday because I forgot to disable Firefox auto updates and it downloaded 2MB of something.
In general, a mobile phone can be used as a modem with a laptop, especially with a bluetooth connection.
3G is just a faster version of GPRS and works slightly less well than GPRS in terms of coverage.
HSDPA is essentially another name for 3G.
EDGE is a double speed GPRS, not well supported in Europe but they have it in the USA.
I carry a Thinkpad X60S 1704 lightweight laptop for flight planning. This has a built-in (Vodafone-locked, unfortunately) GPRS/3G module, and I so often find that wifi is either not available or is priced at silly rates, so I use that.
For airborne use, I have been playing with Thuraya satellite phones but need to do more work on it. It does work but (short of spending loads of money) only as a 9600 baud dial-up.
GPRS and 3G data is charged at the same rate per MB. On contracts, one often gets some free monthly allowance, though this tends to apply only to NON roaming usage (basically everything abroad is roaming - even a Vodafone UK SIM card connecting to Vodafone France is classed as 'roaming' - a huge ripoff). The juiciest contract deals have an allowance on roaming data too. PAYG data is usually expensive. There have been various deals on UK (non roaming) but roaming is usually £5 (Virgin) to £10 (Vodafone area) per MB - got to make sure those windoze and antivirus updates are disabled!!!! I had disabled all my auto updates and still blew away £20 on my last holiday because I forgot to disable Firefox auto updates and it downloaded 2MB of something.
In general, a mobile phone can be used as a modem with a laptop, especially with a bluetooth connection.
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The data rates are an absolute minefield; every network is different and they carefully avoid revealing how much more roaming rates are.
For example Vodafone.co.uk (click on Mobile Internet) offers £1/day unlimited data; this is NON roaming but they don't say so.
Similarly their £7.50/month contract with unlimited ("fair usage") data is NON roaming, but again they don't draw attention to that.
After a lot of work I found a page showing some roaming charges. These vary according to country and which network you roam with. For Austria:
£5 per day for up to 15MB
or £4.99 per MB
and that is just Vodafone. There are other networks, with different charges.
I normally use Virgin for data when I can because they are £5/MB for both roaming and non-roaming but it looks like Voda dropped from £10 to £5/MB recently.
Something worth considering is a contract, rather than PAYG. Not so great for flying usage because this is heavily concentrated into the summer, but if one can get a contract SIM card for one's normal phone, and then use that phone as a GPRS/3G modem, one is at least using the same SIM card for both jobs. Some of the recent contracts have lower cost data than they used to be for a long time.
For example Vodafone.co.uk (click on Mobile Internet) offers £1/day unlimited data; this is NON roaming but they don't say so.
Similarly their £7.50/month contract with unlimited ("fair usage") data is NON roaming, but again they don't draw attention to that.
After a lot of work I found a page showing some roaming charges. These vary according to country and which network you roam with. For Austria:
£5 per day for up to 15MB
or £4.99 per MB
and that is just Vodafone. There are other networks, with different charges.
I normally use Virgin for data when I can because they are £5/MB for both roaming and non-roaming but it looks like Voda dropped from £10 to £5/MB recently.
Something worth considering is a contract, rather than PAYG. Not so great for flying usage because this is heavily concentrated into the summer, but if one can get a contract SIM card for one's normal phone, and then use that phone as a GPRS/3G modem, one is at least using the same SIM card for both jobs. Some of the recent contracts have lower cost data than they used to be for a long time.
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£5 per Mb is pretty expensive these days. For the UK it is VERY expensive - T-Mobile is £7.50 a month for unlimited data and roaming is £1.50 per Mb in Western Europe.
See:
Detailed Costs - Going Abroad - T-Mobile
See:
Detailed Costs - Going Abroad - T-Mobile
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Indeed but I was talking about PAYG and you were talking about a contract
£7.50/month and £1.50/MB data while roaming is a pretty good deal. There are other similar deals around I think - a fairly recent development.
But I don't think many pilots will want to be paying £7.50/month for a SIM card which is stuck inside a laptop or inside some GPRS/3G adapter. This is what I was getting at when I mentioned using one's main mobile phone as a GPRS/3G modem - then it can make sense because most people use their mobile phone sufficiently (for voice) to make this a reasonable deal.
£7.50/month and £1.50/MB data while roaming is a pretty good deal. There are other similar deals around I think - a fairly recent development.
But I don't think many pilots will want to be paying £7.50/month for a SIM card which is stuck inside a laptop or inside some GPRS/3G adapter. This is what I was getting at when I mentioned using one's main mobile phone as a GPRS/3G modem - then it can make sense because most people use their mobile phone sufficiently (for voice) to make this a reasonable deal.
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I use a Hawking hi-gain USB antenna and often pick up "stray" unsecure wifi connections in cities around the world. Admittedly only tends to work well in densely populated areas where there are plenty of "linksys", "netgear" and "belkin" SSID's without encryption.
Well, I find 3G VERY expensive....and coverage is distinctly patchy.
In Germany, you can buy a month's unlimited 24/7 T-Mobile WiFi for about €22 - a much better deal than the €6 per hour you can be ripped off for in many hotels or airports
!!
Whenever staying in an hotel, I always fill out their 'guest feedback' form stating that WiFi access should be free - as it is in most US/Canadian hotels and airports.
In Germany, you can buy a month's unlimited 24/7 T-Mobile WiFi for about €22 - a much better deal than the €6 per hour you can be ripped off for in many hotels or airports
!!Whenever staying in an hotel, I always fill out their 'guest feedback' form stating that WiFi access should be free - as it is in most US/Canadian hotels and airports.
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HSPA/HSDPA/EDGE/GPRS means you can be pretty certain to always have a connection wherever you are, almost anywhere in the world these days. But as said, roaming is usually very expensive.
WiFi is amazingly cheap or even free, but not available everywhere.
In other words, have both, and use WiFi whenever it is available. For non-roaming, HSPA is outstanding, so one probably wants that for use 'at home' anyway!
HSPA/HSDPA means you won't be needing ADSL or a cable modem at home either, depending on pricing for non-roaming access... But that's another story...
WiFi is amazingly cheap or even free, but not available everywhere.
In other words, have both, and use WiFi whenever it is available. For non-roaming, HSPA is outstanding, so one probably wants that for use 'at home' anyway!
HSPA/HSDPA means you won't be needing ADSL or a cable modem at home either, depending on pricing for non-roaming access... But that's another story...
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Generally speaking, it is always best to have a local SIM card. That way you can avoid the absurd roaming charges. The exception is 3, and I'm going to make another endorsement here - since switching from rip-off Vodafone my roaming bills have fallen by about 75% 
. This uses the 'home' tariff on wholly-owned networks (e.g. Italy, Austria, HK, etc), so if you mainly/only travel to these countries you probably don't need a local card.
. This uses the 'home' tariff on wholly-owned networks (e.g. Italy, Austria, HK, etc), so if you mainly/only travel to these countries you probably don't need a local card.
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There Three broadband is excellent WHERE IT WORKS. You avoid the expensive data charges, as you're on a flat fee.
The downside is that it only works in a handful of countries (which does not include France...most likely destination for UK pilots). If you are outside a partner country, then it simply does not work at all, at any price.
From memory the countries that it works in are UK, Ireland, Austria, Italy, Sweeden. Then it also works in Hong Kong & Australia if you are on contract, but not prepay.
Outside the list of supported countries, then you have no data access.
dp
The downside is that it only works in a handful of countries (which does not include France...most likely destination for UK pilots). If you are outside a partner country, then it simply does not work at all, at any price.
From memory the countries that it works in are UK, Ireland, Austria, Italy, Sweeden. Then it also works in Hong Kong & Australia if you are on contract, but not prepay.
Outside the list of supported countries, then you have no data access.
dp
